As a devoted Flight Simulator hobbyist since FS98, a GA pilot in the real world, and an avid reader of this and other similar forums, it is obvious to me that despite all the numerous and helpful suggested tweaks/changes, many on mid-range systems and below are just not getting the performace they expect out of FS9. It is not good enough to say "Upgrade your system". This sim came with the promise on the box it would work on systems above 450MHz! For myself I have spent many hours, days trying every possible tweak including diabling autogen xml, installing the new less-intensive autogen textures, Chris Willis' clouds etc, but the performance when it really counts - on approach and landing - is still totally unacceptable, a slideshow with framerates at single numbers and sometimes down to 1-2. This is with most display sliders at less than half, on high-colour 16bit at 1152x864. The only way I can fix this on final approach is to pause the flight and change the time to force a refresh. This, of course, wrecks the enjoyment of the entire flight.The only add-on I am using is FSMeteo for weather. I can't even begin to think how bad it would be with the additional add-ons I use in FS2002 - add-on scenery and landclass, Radar Contact, FSTraffic. Performance after take-off is, apart from the occasional stutter, fairly smooth but if you can't land the aircraft on steady framerates (at least above 10) you may as well not fly at all (that's my view anyway).We must judge this sim on how it performs at the critical phase of a realistic flight not on just flying around. I wonder if those who claim to be satisfied with FS9, like Chris Willis and others, have actually tried a complete flight from say LA to San Francisco, Paris to London, Melbourne to Sydney in any of the default Boeings? Can they report acceptable framerates on all phases of the flight right to the gate?If this sim cannot do that for users with averagesystems, such as my own, it is a failure. Simple as that.Clearly I am not the only one experiencing problems as evident by the huge number of similar posts on this and other forums. And we are serious simmers - what about all the FS9 purchasere who do not vist the forums or use the internet?The bottom line: Microsoft must fix this sim and has no excuse for not doing so.My system:Athlon AMD 1900XPEpox-8KTA3L+512 SDRAMGeForce3 TI200Detonator Driver 40.72DirectX9.1b on WinME

All too right, Tom, I fear. I have just tried - yet again - to fly seriously in FS9 after tweaking like an idiot for weeks (which I HATE having to do, that's not why I use FS). I flew in Europe in moderate weather and, sure enough, after a reasonably pleasant but jerky flight I struggled to hold her on landing; not because there was any crosswind or windshear to worry about but because the FPS dropped to 2.4. And just to round things off, she fell through the taxiway (default plane, default airport) on the way to the terminal.Then I did the same flight in FS2002. If FS2002 was the sim that had just been released, I would now be crying from the rooftops just how good and fluid it is and how everyone should buy it immediately!None of this is new news, but it's bad news.Mark "Dark Moment" Beaumonthttp://www.swiremariners.com/newlogo.jpg

Well-as an avid flight simmer since 1980-I don't get it.I just practiced all my multiengine procedures with fs9 with SC megascenery which looks photo real, real weather, and a cockpit which very nearly matches the Beech Duchess I am using in the real world for my multi engine training.I have already saved $168 hr for the aircraft not to mention the instructor costs in addition, by practicing every maneuver to the finest detail over and over-and yes with fluidity, real looking weather to match what is outside, and scenery that looks like the real thing.I am truly sorry for those reporting problems-but I sure don't get them on my setup-athlon 2100, geforce 4200ti,512k ram.Scratching head why this sim runs fine for many and not for others.I am certainly not questioning that it is not running fine for you-but it seems it does for others. That is the key. Rather than pronouncing that it runs "great" or that it runs "badly" maybe the answer is why does it run great on some setups and not run great on others?.....It would be interesting for avsim to do a survey to find the % of those who are satisfied and those who are not (performance).I suspect that the satistfied would be the majority.I suspect that many put their favorite plane in along with favorite add in and go-that may be part of the problem. My favorite add in is my plane-the B33 beech debonair-but it eats frames-as some of the gauges go back to fs98. Use a different aircraft and voila! Is it fair to blame fs9 because my plane using older gauges etc. slows it down? I am glad backwards compatibility was included-but I am not going to blame MS if that backward compatiblity slows it down.You mention Fsmeteo-what happens if you don't use it. It is my understanding that both Fsmeteo and activesky are scrambling to update to the new version-is it fair to base performance on a third party utility that may not be quite up to date yet?But before we proclaim facts-perhaps we should get them...I'll be willing to go with what is the majority.http://mywebpages.comcast.net/geofa/pages/Geofdog2.jpg

I hoping for a patch, until then I'm forced to stay with FS2002.

Hi Tom, ``fairly smooth but if you can't land the aircraft on steady framerates (at least above 10)`Try the same flight without FS meteo and see. use 2x antialasing at at max. I have seen problems with fs meteo that`s get stutters and freez, pausing etc.-Do not overdone your details with your system spec.-The earlier reports from autogen near airports from others FPS drop near 15 fps which never happen to me, the max was 5 fps and it's was like a flashing eyes. 25/20/25 poof. Not all noticed the huge fps drop and not all renamed the XML and the FS9.cfg.-Drop to 1 or 2 fps never seen this at all, Eithers all, Freez, Crash, freez or fps hit drop on 2d panel with default;How I can able to reproduce these? -Crash-Fps drop to 1 and 2-2d Panel default drop 5 fps or 6 fps-Freez-Pause-Dramatic 15/20 fps hit near airports-Runways light texture with Black square-Unable to see the water reflection/animation-Green Sky texture, weird ground terrain-Solid horizon degradation-My aircraft Crash Fs2004-When I switch to 2d panel, the Sim CrashEtcThe only way for me is to try it on another system config spec and add the same software installed with same addons installed, run software in background or not, same video card, same drivers, same registry, same hardisk capacity, same motherboard, Same Os, Same Bios, Same chipset, same driver etc.I Use windows xp and I will never looks back. I am using 1024x768 32 bits, 2x antialasing, fs 2004 to full right, cloud draw mil to 40 and cloud % to 100, except shadows not a single crash like others reports, not a single freez like some others reports, not a single drop in fps with 2d default aircraft like others reports, I do not have to remove my sound card that's cause stutters etcI have drop on 3rd party 2d panel only improved by panelastexture=0 the problems where almost gone.between 20 and 30 fps near the ground, 30 and 80 fps higher than 10 000 feet. Normaly I locked to 20 fps; ASUS P4P800 8X, GFORCE 4TI 4200 128MB 8X, P4 2.533 GHZ AT 533******How I will able to reproduce this constant FPS, in my home;***********From FPSFREAK users here:The machine I speak of is a:3.06 P4 533Mhz FSB at 150Mhz FSB for 3.45 Ghz, 100% stable with stock Intel HSF unit.512 Megs PC1066 Rambus9700Pro 128 with Zalman Heatpipe w 40mm fan on cold plate at 405 / 371ASUS P4T533-C MB80Gig WD HD w 8Meg CacheCoolermaster atc-111 case w 5 80mm thermaltake fans, 4 on Rheostat Fanbus.Soundblaster Live ValueRunning the latest intel INF driversOmega Drivers based on Cat 3.6'sCreative DriversAfter editing the FS9 config file with the usual entries, I found that besides the known menu flickering issue, I experienced none of the issues posted about FS9. It looks fantastic, framerate locked at 30 w it constant 90% of the time w all sliders except clouds and autogen at 90% or better. To be honest it seems to run FS9 better than it did 2002. I have to buy part of his system spec which is a high end and mine a mid.ThanksChris Willis[link:fsw.simflight.com/FSWMenuFsSim.html]Clouds And Addons For MsFs

Hi there,>I wonder if those who claim to be satisfied with FS9, like Chris Willis and others, have actually tried a complete flight from say LA to San Francisco, Paris to London, Melbourne to Sydney in any of the default Boeings?:)).Considering the amount of complex add-ons I use should more than compensate for my slightly faster system - the bottom line is, with a bit of tweaking you should be able to get acceptable performance out of FS. But don't limit it to your FS and graphics card settings, but, more importantly check your Windows settings, background processes etc. A less than perfect Windows install can have a huge impact on performance.Cheers,Gosta,http://hifi.avsim.net/activesky/images/wxrebeta.jpg

For me, the sim runs quite well in all views and instances EXCEPT when I'm using the 2d cockpit. That drops framerates down into the jerky zone. The flight is pretty darn smooth with the VC though.

I agree completely. After finally giving up trying to assemble the perfect flight sim system, I settled on a somewhat primative (and quite affordable) Emachine featuring an AMD 2200 processor running at 1.85Ghz,512MB RAM, and added my old GEForce2 MMX 64MB video card.Without AA ( which cuts my frame rates in half...but looks pretty ),I'm setting at between 20-30FPS on an average with my sliders set to at least half way or above.I'm a GA guy that flys primarily the default Cessna 172/182 and Dreamfleet's 150. They all have behaved quite well without all of the anomolies that have been reported by the other sim pilots. I wonder, if for once, Microsoft finally developed something for the average computer and the problems lie with all of the people with the upper end systems?

People that don't get the performance they expect don't do so because the product is flawed but because their expectations are flawed.Nothing Microsoft can do to change those expectations except removing all the sliders people use to improve visual detail beyond what their hardware can show and give them only a choice "best performance, best visuals, best compromise" and that's it.But that would cause a load of complaints from those very same people that they can't set X again to what they like...iow, customers are trouble. Can't live with them, can't live without them.

I am really sorry for all the people (and there seems to be quite a number) who can't use FS9 properly because of performance problems and stutters. But I have to agree with several other posters, FS9 runs very reasonable since I have found my personal "sweet spot". Most important, I got rid of AA with my GeForce Ti4200. I run the sim at 1600x1200x32 on an 19" CRT, and it looks really good. I don't use any weather addon, because I'm quite content with the default weather capabilities of FS9. I have autogen to max-1, scenery complexity to medium, and reflections of. Even the AI at 75% does not slow the sim down as much as it did in FS2002.When I first installed FS9 there were some situations with bad weather close to complex default airports like Seattle where I received stutters, but I haven't experienced this with my current settings.One last thing that really makes my sim hum at a perfect steady 20 FPS: bush flying! When I take a Cessna, Piper or some oldtimer, and fly in the Cascades or Alaska, I never need to worry about FPS ;) Get away from these big cities, forget the big jets, and life is much easier :)VOlker :]

I've got to go along with the majority here- it works fine for me.However- a couple of points I would make.I have installed quite a few other aircraft - some from FS2000/2002 and some "new" ones supposedly made for 2004.I have found that some of these run very well and some of them don't.It's not possible to say that all"old" aircaft don't run well or that all "new" aircraft do.In fact one of the worst offenders is an aircraft specifically written for FS2004- the frame rates definately suffer with it .Conversely- my favorite aircraft is the Grumman Greyhound/Hawkeye written for FS2002 which performs flawlessly.To the person(sorry can't remember which one it was) who made the point about " complete flights in a default aircraft"- no I haven't tried that,but yesterday evening I flew (on line with Vatsim for 2 hours) from Reno/KRNO to Miramar/KNKX using the C-2A Greyhound.In order to do this online I had running FS2004(obviously),AOL Broadband connection,Servinfo,Squawkbox,Roger Wilco.In addition I was using the GPS and also the VPN version of the kneepad( The last two and Servinfo were on the slave monitor).Lastly ,as there was no ATC available for the second half of the flight,I was playing MP3s on the Windows Media player as well.The Fps stayed more or less at 30(locked there)in any view except for occasional drops to about 25 ,and down to about 20 for the landing and take off runs.The FS settings are all at around 75%.AA is off.Screen Res is 1024x768x32.My system,while not anything like the latest thing (Full system info is at the bottom of this post) is a reasonably capable affair which I built about a year ago.As I have said on this forum before,when I first assembled it,it wouldn't run FS2002 for more than 20 mins without problems(Lockup,freezes etc).There was nothing wrong with FS2002- the problem was the system- excess heat,low 3.3/5V voltages /less than optimum BIOS settings.A few weeks of tinkering around eventually produced a machine that can run FS2002 or FS2004 endlessly without problems.I guess what I am saying is that ,while FS2004 isn't perfect(indeed I doubt if we'll ever see perfection as demanded by some who post on here),it certainly isn't bad.It's a step forward from 2002 and hopefully this progress will continue in 2006 etc.By the law of diminishing returns,the differences become less noticeable with each new edition of the software.Personally(This is where I get shot down in flames)I believe that a good percentage of those with problems should look first at their systems.Check out the voltages,system/CPU/VideoCard and Chipset temperatures,and also look carefully at the BIOS settings.Before someone says it- my BIOS settings(see below) are set for stability with reasonable speed ,rather than for sheer speedSYSTEMAMD Athlon 2000XP (@133/133)ECS K7S5A Mobo 3.1 :04/29/02 Rev BiosSiS 735 Chipset Rev 12 x 256mb DDR RAMGeforce4 Ti-4200-8x 128mb DDR AGP running 17" IBM Monitor and 15" LG MonitorAGP 1.16 WHQL . 4403 Detonator XP Drivers2 x Maxtor 40GB HDD (7200rpm)LG 8x4x32 BurnerLG 52xDirect X 9.0 final Windows ME/ Windows XP dual bootBIOS Settings- DRAM Timing Ultra. CAS Latency 3T,RAS ACtive 6T,RAS Precharge 3TL1 Cache Enabled.L2 Cache Enabled.Sys BIOS Cache Disabled.DRAM Drive Slew Rating - FastDave.

Hi Jeroen,>People that don't get the performance they expect don't do so because the product is flawed but because their expectations are flawed.http://hifi.avsim.net/activesky/images/wxrebeta.jpg

Jeroen,Whereas I am sure that some of the problems mentioned here are related to "setting the sliders too high", I have to say that your simplification of matters really baffles me. Recently I bought a completely new system consisting of state-of-the-art components and I am sorry to say that it does not run FS9 well at all. Frame rates are fine and stutters do not occur, but in my case I have a constant stream of flashing rays, beams and triangles across the screen. None of this occurs with other applications, including FS2002. I am sure that you will say that it is related to ATI, since I own a Radeon 9800Pro. Personally I do not know who is to blame. ATI, since it is their card or driver that seems to cause problems, or Microsoft, since it their software that is causing problems. The one thing I know for sure is that it is not me or my flawed expections.I certainly hope that your future posts will reflect somewhat less of a biased view.With best regards,HenriSome relevant specs:Intel Pentium 4 2.8 GHz, 800 MHzZalman CNPS700-AlCu CPU coolerAsus P4p800 Deluxe, S478, i865PESapphire Radeon 9800Pro 128 Mb1024 Mb DDR SDRAM, PC32002x Maxtor DiamondMax Plus 9, 120 Gb, 7200 rpm, 8Mb, SATA 150Creative Soundblaster Audigy II playerWindows XP Pro

>>>I certainly hope that your future posts will reflect somewhat less of a biased view<<

"One last thing.......even on my machine, and even if windows says that its not needed, I defrag at least once a month."I do mine every week- Saturday morning while having breakfast I clean temporary internet files,delete old backups(I have Powerquest 2ndChance- makes a backup daily of the OS drives but I only keep one week),run full virus scan and defrag all drives.All this takes maybe 40 mins total and it's well worth doing .Dave